


Cracking Christmas

by DrunkOnAmortentia



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-21
Updated: 2019-12-21
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:15:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21887287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DrunkOnAmortentia/pseuds/DrunkOnAmortentia
Summary: Hermione tries to get Draco in the holiday spirit, but he’s perplexed by her Muggle Christmas traditions.
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Draco Malfoy
Comments: 4
Kudos: 22
Collections: Strictly Dramione Christmas Fest 2019





	Cracking Christmas

**Author's Note:**

> A very big thank you to my best friend Kristin for encouraging me to finally write something and for listening to all of my dramatics throughout the process! I hope you all enjoy my first ever Dramione!

“This is simply a waste of time, Granger. I’m not interested,” huffed Malfoy for what felt like the 145th time in the past ten minutes. If she had known that trying to get him in the holiday spirit would take her right out of it, she would have looked the other way when she saw him turn positively green when their department head let them know they would be hosting the Ministry’s holiday reception. She thought she was being nice, but now she was positive that he was the sole reason St. Nicholas started putting coal in people’s stockings. 

Maybe he really is just a scrooge and I should call this a loss… Hermione thought before she was interrupted by Draco’s screech. 

“HONESTLY, woman! I don’t know why you thought I would enjoy coming to listen to this group of strangers sing to me with their untrained voices in the freezing cold. I’m going home and I hope you will give up your noble quest of getting me in the spirit. I told you, I just don’t enjoy the holidays. I’ll see you in the office tomorrow.” 

He was gone before she had a chance to argue with him. 

I can’t believe I ever thought that this would be a good idea. Now I’m here in the cold by myself. Only Malfoy could become enraged by a children's school choir performing Christmas carols, she told herself.

\-----

“I’ve told you, Gin, Christmas has always been special to me and I just thought since we’re closer now that we work together, he might be interested in sharing my fondness of the holiday.” 

“Is that the only thing you want to share with him?” Ginny interrupted her with a waggle of her eyebrows. 

“You cannot seriously be on about this again, can you?” Hermione asked her in a huff. “I’ve told you once and I’ll tell you again, just because you rode off into the sunset with Blaise and I may or may not have drunkenly told you at your hen do that I thought Draco had dreamy eyes - does NOT mean that I want anything else to happen between us.” 

“Okay you’re righ—” Ginny started to say but was interrupted by Hermione’s exasperated tone.

“And even IF something did happen, we work together now! He is a grade A git and I cannot imagine spending voluntary time with him. How can anyone stand to be around him? I hate the way he slightly raises his left eyebrow at me when he knows someone is getting on my nerves, and the way he has my coffee on my desk for me when I come into the office in the mornings — who has the time or energy to remember my latte order?” 

“I suppose—” Ginny tried to interject again only to be cut off once more. 

“AND HOW DARE HE always send me a single stargazer lily and gladiolus on the anniversary of me sending my parents to Australia… who does these things for other people?” Hermione was panting now having worked herself up packing in front of Ginny’s kitchen table. 

“Granger, you do know he has been hopelessly in love with you since he moved home from university, right?” Blaise said as he sauntered into the kitchen. 

“You are both absolutely mad. And to prove that to you, I’m going to ask him to be my date to the Ministry's holiday reception. And when he turns me down, and I’m left to plan and attend the party by myself, you both can accompany me to make up for it,” Hermione ranted.

Ginny and Blaise exchanged a look and a smirk before they both answered Hermione with “You’re on.” 

“I look forward to seeing you on New Year’s Eve, Granger,” Blaise said. “Because you will clearly be busy with your Christmas date, would you like us to add a plus one onto your invitation for our New Years celebration? We can have one of the guest suites made up so when you inevitably shag each other senseless into 2020, it doesn't happen on our good sofa.”

“I love your confidence, Zabini, but he would have to agree to go out with me in the first place so keep your plus ones and your guest suites to yourself. I’ll see you all later, thanks for the laugh!” Hermione said as she headed for the floo. 

What in the hell did she just get herself into?

\-----

Okay, Hermione, you’ve got this. You can’t back out now, Hermione thought to herself as she walked into her office exceedingly early with two coffees and a special package in her bag. She had woken up much before her usual rising time this morning to stop at the new Starbucks and pick up Draco’s favorite tea for him. Not that she had gone out of her way to notice that he drank a London Fog with soy milk and one pump of sugar free vanilla every morning, but when you spend that much time with someone, you just learn things. 

She situated the cup on the corner of his desk and reached into her bag to pull out the item she had spent all weekend working on. Hermione Granger was a lot of things, but crafty was not one of them. As she hesitantly placed the cracker on his desk, she started to sweat and immediately second guess herself. Just as she went to throw it back in her bag, she heard the office door click open, so she threw herself into her chair and tried to act casual, spilling her own cup of coffee in the process. 

“Morning Grang…” Malfoy stopped as he made eye contact with the cup of tea already on his desk. “What’s this?” he asked with that stupid quirk of his eyebrow. 

“Oh, nothing, I woke up early and figured I owed you since you’re always bringing mine in.”

“Well it’s a bloody good thing I bring yours everyday because from the looks of it, your cup didn't fare too well today,” he said passing her the extra cup in his hand with a chuckle. 

“Did you see who brought this package in?” he asked as he picked the cracker up off of his desk. “Looks like Christmas bloody well exploded on this, doesn't it?” 

Hermione sat there wishing the ground would swallow her whole. “Well…” she said as she pushed her hair out of her face, “it-was-actually-me-who-put-that-on-your-desk!” she spit out as quickly as possible. 

“It-was-stupid-really-no-need-to-even-bother-with-it!” she said as she lunged to take it back from him. 

“Is this you trying to push your Muggle traditions on me again, Granger? How does it work?” he asked holding it just outside of her reach. 

“Well, typically you would stand around with family and friends and link arms and you would pull one end of the cracker that is next to you, but in this case, I think you can just pop it yourself… Honestly, it was silly anyways, don’t even worry about it!” She turned to walk back to her desk and tried to distract him by bringing up a case that they had been working on for months. “So I think that the artifacts recovered from the vault should all be—” 

*POP!* 

Her eyes went wide and she spun around to see the confetti and crown on his desk with the note in his hand. 

“Why Granger, I didn’t know you were the type to ask a bloke on a first date.” 

“No need to patronize me, Malfoy, it was stupid. I just thought since we both had to be so involved in planning it would make sense if we went together. Just forget it,” she said as she went to bury herself beneath piles of paperwork until she could slip into a wine-induced coma to forget the embarrassment that was currently her life. 

“What shall I wear?” he asked. 

“What?!” Hermione responded with wide eyes. 

“Well, if I’m to attend with you, shouldn’t we at least look like we belong together?” 

Hermione looked at him dumbfounded. “So you mean you actually want to go with me?” she asked. 

“Well yes, as long as you don’t make me participate in anymore of your silly traditions, although this one did have a nice ending,” he winked and left her standing in their office alone. 

Oh, Ginny is going to love this, she groaned to herself. 

\-----

Why am I nervous? It’s just another work event, Hermione thought as she threw another rejected dress into the ever-growing pile on her bed. Why does it matter if he likes what I’m wearing or not? It’s just a casual date between coworkers, nothing more. 

Although even she found it hard to believe as she looked at herself in the mirror in nothing but her evergreen matching lingerie set, which had absolutely nothing to do with Malfoy’s obsession with Slytherin house. She was just being festive and in the holiday spirit, thank you very much. 

She finally decided on a deep burgundy velvet wrap dress that draped flawlessly over her skin, down to the tops of her black pointed toe pumps. The deep tone accentuated her caramel skin color and, as she moved, her leg poked out of the large slit. She knew she had chosen appropriately and planned to tease Malfoy throughout the evening. Hey, even if this was a totally casual date, she could still have fun trying to get a blush across his cheeks. She quickly grabbed the tie she had selected for him and transfigured it to match her dress color perfectly. 

As she heard a knock on the door she took one final look in the mirror followed by a deep breath. “You’ve got this, Granger,” she mumbled as she walked to welcome her guest. 

“Malfoy, good evening, please come in!”

She stepped back from the door and became nervous when he made no effort to cross the threshold. Maybe he had changed his mind after seeing her. This had been such a stupid, stupid idea. 

“You, you look great, Granger. I mean… you clean up nice or whatever,” he said as he finally came through the door. “What. in. the. fuck. is that?” he spit out. “I thought little miss S.P.E.W was against having house elves?!” he said as he spotted the festive elf situated in the corner of her dining nook. 

Hermione giggled to herself, forgetting that she had put out all of the Christmas decorations that she had inherited from her parents’ dusty attic. “That's my Christmas elf, Malfoy. Just another one of my silly traditions I suppose,” she said as she strode over and flipped the switch at the base of the toy.

“Have a holly jolly Christmas, it’s the best time of the year…!!!” sprang to life from the speaker as the elf’s mechanical jaw flapped. 

“That is equally terrifying and insulting to house elves everywhere, Granger. You shock me,” Malfoy said as he continued staring at the robot shaking its hips. “Muggles,” he muttered under his breath. 

“I suppose we should be going — don’t want to be late for our own party after all, and I most certainly do not want you to continue harassing me about my FAKE elf,” she said as she ushered him towards the floo. 

As they exited the floo, Draco slipped his hand into Hermione’s which prompted her to gaze up at him with panic. “What?” he said, “is this a date or not?”

“Yes… I suppose it is,” she answered as she gripped his hand and they entered the party together. 

Every eye flew towards the door and it was so quiet everyone could hear when Blaise shouted “OI” after his darling wife had kicked him to alert him of their best friends’ presence. 

Draco steered Hermione to the bar; he knew he would need something strong to get through the night filled with all of the whispers. In hindsight, hitting the bottle may not have been the best idea because after no time at all, he was thoroughly sloshed and he had an inkling that Granger was as well. 

They spent the night drinking and dancing just a bit too close to give Blaise and Ginny a good show. Hermione had not expected to feel such a rush from being in his arms and decided that she needed a moment to clear her head. 

“Watch my purse, ‘m just gonna run to the loo with Gin!” Hermione slurred out at him as she sashayed away from their table. She purposely shook her hips with a bit more attitude than normal because she could feel his eyes on her. 

As soon as they closed the door to the bathroom, Ginny burst into a fit of giggles. “Hermione, you realize you have both been shagging each other with your eyes all night, right?” she asked. 

“We have not!... wait… have I been that obvious? I mean, come on. You’ve seen him. The man looks like sex on a stick tonight,” Hermione sighed as she leaned against the sink to try to catch her balance and sort through the emotions that were running through her head and her body. 

“I think I’ll go tell him to meet you in here?” Ginny said as she walked out the door. 

“Well, I suppose… WAIT NO! What on earth Ginevra! You will do no such thing!” But it was too late — Ginny was gone.

\------------

*knock knock* 

“Nobody’s here!” Hermione called out. 

She was answered with a chuckle and a quiet Alohomora. Before she knew it, Draco was standing much too close to her in the tiny bathroom. I mean WHO even designs women’s restrooms? Could they not leave any space to breathe?!

“Before you ask, no, I did not leave your purse unattended,” he quipped as he turned to the side to show off that he had draped her purse over his shoulder and was sporting it as if it was part of his own outfit. 

“That’s a good look for you Malfoy,” she replied as she reached inside and pulled out two Sober-Up potions. “Here, Malfoy, I have a feeling we will both need clear heads this evening.”

“I’ve decided that I have had enough of this Malfoy this and Granger that nonsense,” he said in a low purr. “Do you know my real name, Hermione?” 

She swore she could feel every syllable of her name rolling off his lips radiate down her spine. “Yes, Draco. I know your name. I just wasn’t aware that we were at that point in our friendship,” Hermione said while trying to maintain her composure. 

“Oh, my sweet, sweet Hermione, I think we both know that we have been well past that for awhile now, wouldn’t you agree?”

Hermione felt her breath hitch and was absolutely convinced that this bathroom was shrinking. “Yes, I’d say you are correct,” she managed to blurt out before she launched herself at him. 

He had her set on the counter with her legs wrapped around his waist before either of them could process that they were in an unlocked bathroom inside the Ministry of Magic. 

They were quickly brought back to their senses when Luna Lovegood, the newly appointed Magical Creature Ambassador entered. “Oh, there you two are,” she said. “Your friends are gathered around the table taking bets on whether or not you will shag in this bathroom.” 

Hermione squeaked when she realized people knew exactly what she was doing and where she was doing it. Draco began to drag her out of the bathroom, throwing a “Thanks Luna!” over his shoulder as they went. 

“Zabini!” he yelled as they approached their table. “500 Galleons says I don’t shag her in the bathroom and another 250 that says I’ll have her wrapped around me in my bed in the next 20 minutes.” 

“DRACO MALFOY!” Hermione shouted at him as she swatted his shoulder. 

Everyone at the table gaped at them with wide eyes, not sure what would unfold of the scene in front of them. 

“Well, Zabini, pay up. I believe you owe Draco 750 galleons.” Hermione started to pull Draco towards the door. “OH! You’ll want to make sure that guest suite is made up for your New Year’s Eve party, wouldn’t want to ruin your good sofa, am I right?” she called over her shoulder as they went to make their exit. 

"I guess these Muggle Christmas traditions worked out in my favor didn't they?" Draco asked Hermione. "I think they worked out for both of us" she smiled at him.


End file.
